The 3dcart Promotion manager is a powerful tool that lets you set special discounts and enticements for your customers and help drive traffic and sales to your store. Promotions can range anywhere from simple free shipping on qualified purchases to more advanced marketing campaigns like first-time customer coupons.

Go to Marketing >Promotion Manager

Click on the button labeled "+Add Promotion"

The page will now present you with the following options/fields to populate:

Promotion Name: This will be the promotion's display name.

Promotion DescriptionThis will be the short description of your promotion

NoteWhen a promotion is applicable to your customer's shopping cart, the name and short description will appear on the cart along with the promotion's offering. (e.g. the discount amount or promotion specifics)

Start Date: Use this to set the Promotion's Start Date

End Date: Use this section to specify when the promotion will end. (If you plan to have the promotion last indefinitely, you can have its end date be several decades from now.)

Promotion Type: How the promotion will be activated. Your choices are:

Automatic PromoThe promotion will apply automatically when applicable to the customer's cart.

Coupon Promotion: The promotion will only apply when the customer inputs a coupon code in the shopping cart. The text box next to Coupon Promotion is where the code will be configured by you.

Discount:The amount of discount the promotion will apply to the customer's cart. This can be specified as either a dollar amount, or a percentage.

When these fields are populated, click on the "+Save" button to complete the promotion.

NoteUpon saving the promotion, the Promotion Manager interface will display additional settings for the promotion. When first creating the promotion however, the interface will advise you that the promotion is not yet enabled (along with a link to enable the promotion). It is recommended to specify your additional settings before enabling the promotion.

Additional Settings

Total Allowed Uses:Use this feature to specify how many times the promotion can be used in your store. This is useful if you want to have a promotion that only applies to a limited total number of uses. (i.e. "First 10 customers get 50% off!") By default, this setting will be 999 total uses

Uses per Customer: - Use this text box to specify how many times the promotion can be used by each customer. By default, this setting will be listed with 1 use per customer.

Next to these two new settings, you will have the following additional settings to configure on the promotion. These are split into 2 distinct sections:

Promotion Offers

Click on the "+Promotion Offers" button to reveal the Promotion Offers section where you will see the following options:

Discount Offered The amount of the discount that the promotion will award upon its use. You will also have the following checkboxes available for the discount:

Is Percentage Denotes the discount as being a percentage of the order's total

Applies per Item Applies the discount to each item individually

Free Shipping Offeres free shipping on the order (Can be used in conjunction or separately from the discount amount offered)

Exclude Products from these Manufacturers Use the "+Add" and "Remove" button to select the manufacturers that you'd like to exclude from the discount.

Directly below this section, you will configure the following settings that will determine which products the promotional offer/discounts will apply to.

Include Products in these Categories Use the "+Add" and "Remove" buttons to select categories that contain products which will apply to the discount.

If the promotion is triggered, then its offers will be applied only to products that reside in these categories.

For example, in a "Buy any shirt and get a pair of shoes at 15% off" type of promotion, you would set the "Shoes" category in here so that the 15% discount is applied only to the shoes.

Leaving this section blank will apply the promotion/discount to all items in the order

Discount Applies to this Product Use the "Change" button to select one item that the discount will apply to.

This optional setting would be used if you'd like the discount to apply only to one product.

For example, in a "Buy any shirt and get [a specific] pair of shoes at 15% off" type of promotion, you would click the "Change" button and select the specific shoe product.

When using this Discount Application option, be sure that you are not also using the "Include Products in these Categories" section describe above as they will directly conflict with each other.

Fixed Price Product Use the "Change" button to select an item from your store that will be included in the order at a fixed price. After the item is selected, you can enter the price that it will be included into the order for.

This optional setting would be used if you'd like to add a free or flat priced item to the order when the promotion is triggered.

For example, in a "Buy any shirt and get a pair of shoes for 15% off AND a free belt" type of promotion, you would use this setting to select the belt and set its fixed price at 0.

Note that this feature will add the product to the order without any input from the shopper. Therefore, items with selectable options will not be eligible for this feature.

Bonus Reward Point Enter the number of Reward Points that the shopper will be awarded when this promotion is applied.

This optional setting would be used if you'd like to further entice the shopper into using the promotion by oferring them additional reward points added to their account.

Promotion Rules

Click on the "+Promotion Rules" button to reveal the Promotion Rules section. This section is where you will specify the parameters that need to be met on the customer's cart before the Promotion becomes applicable to the order.

In this page you'll have the following options:

Requires coupon

Set this option to "No" if you'd like the promotion to apply automatically with no input from the shopper

Set the option to "Yes" if you'd like to have the promotion apply after the shopper has entered the specific code.

Coupon Code If the "Requires Coupon" setting above is set to "Yes," then you will need to specify a code in this field that will apply the coupon

Discount Group Select the customer pricing group that you'd like the promotion applicable to.

If you'd like to have the the promotion apply only to your retail shoppers, you'd select "None" from the dropdown menu (since these customers do not belong to a special pricing group).

On the other hand if you'd like to promotion to apply to all of your customers (retail and special groups), you'd select "All" from the drop down.

Lastly, if you'd like the promotion to apply to specific group(s), you'd choose "Select Specific" to select groups from your store. Simply select them from the left section and move them to the right to make the promotion apply to those groups.

Country: This area can be used to limit which countries the promotion will apply to. This can be useful in case you want to offer a "free shipping" type promotion, but limit it only to domestic customers.

Note that you can also use the "Exclude List" to remove select areas from eligibility as well

Order Quantity: This is used to set the minimum and maximum amount of products that need to be in the customer's cart before the promotion is activated.

For example, if you want to offer a 10% discount on any orders of 5 or more, you would specify 5 as the minimum.

Order Amount ($): This setting is used to specify the minimum and maximum amount of money that needs to be spent by the customer, before the promotion is activated.

For example, if you want to offer a 10% on any orders over $100, you would specify 100 as the minimum amount.

Non-Stackable: This checkbox will control whether the promotion can be used in combination with other promotions in your store.

Placing a checkmark in this box will specify the promotion as non-stackable - e.g. cannot be combined with any other promotion.

Excluded Items: - If your store has any products that are on sale, or have special quantity discounts applied to them, you can exclude them from promotions with this setting.

Directly below this section, you will configure the following settings that will determine which products will trigger the promotional offer/discounts.

Applies if Products in these Categories are in the basket Use the "+Add" and "Remove" buttons to select categories that contain products which will trigger the discount. If the products are present in the shopper's cart, then the promotion will be applicable to the order

For example, in a "Buy any shirt and get a pair of shoes at 15% off" type of promotion, you would set the "Shirts" category in here so that the promotion is triggered

Leaving this section blank will allow the promotion/discount eligibility to all items in the order

Applies if these Products are in the Basket Use the -NONE SELECTED- link to select an item (and quantity of the item) that will be needed in the cart to qualify for the promotion.

For example, in a "Buy 2 of this specific shirt and get a pair of shoes for 15% off" type of promotionm you would set the specific shirt and a Qty of 2 so that the promotion is triggered.

When using this setting, be sure that you are not also using the "Applies if Products from these Categories are in the Basket" setting mentioned above, as they will directly conflict with each other.

TipIf you choose to configure only specific items for a promotion with the above setting, it is recommended to make the products featured items on your store to allow your customers to easily select them and qualify for the promotion.